‘Why didn’t I learn this blinkin’ lingo before I came here,’ sighed the one who held her captive, then mouthed loudly to Etta, ‘Keep still, I need to check your tube! Do you understand English?’
Her eyes opening wide to project fear, Etta gave a quick nod.
‘Oh, right…’ Having considered her exotic with her dark hair and eyes, the old orderly was momentarily disconcerted, then spoke again, still exaggerating the formation of his words. ‘You can’t speak because they had to cut your windpipe, you were choking. Your hands are only tied down so you didn’t try to pull out your tube when you woke up. If you promise not to do it now I’ll untie them.’ At the signal that she had understood he released her. ‘I know it takes some getting used to but you won’t need it in for very long.’ Impatient and frustrated, her throat feeling raw, Etta performed a scribbling movement with her hand. Understanding this gesture, the orderly reached into his pocket for a stub of pencil and a notebook, upon which the patient scrawled frantically, ‘I’m English. Need to find my husband.’
The man expressed surprise on reading the first part. ‘Oh? You don’t look it.’ Then he scolded her over the second, ‘Just you worry about yourself.’
But Etta wrote feverishly, ‘Urgent! How long was I unconscious?’
‘Not long.’ He took the notebook away. ‘I don’t know how on earth you managed it, not even nurses are allowed this close to the line. Now, I’ll be back to check your tube again in a while, I’ve others to see to you know.’
And, too shaken and feeble to object, Etta was left to lie there, fuming and worrying amidst the mayhem.
The orderly did come back seemingly ages later to clean her tube, and also to say that she was to be moved to a safer place, which did not meet with her approval.
I can’t go! Etta raged wordlessly, trying to drag at the other’s sleeve. Don’t you understand? I have to get to Marty! She gestured for his notebook but was ignored. Then, despite all grimacing protest, she was lifted up and loaded into an ambulance and, along with a groaning selection of bloodied soldiers, packed into its dark interior and driven away.
Hot tears of helpless rage welled in her eyes, spilled onto her cheeks and trickled down her neck into her hair as she was packed off like a parcel. Marty, oh Marty!
Stacked like sardines, Etta and her fellow patients were taken far behind the lines, back to where she’d been, from where she had fought so hard to come. Separated from the rest now and also from her suitcase, which had been lost, though her rolled-up cape travelled with her, she was handed over to a company of nuns who, using their own stretcher, toted her towards a waiting cart. Made giddy by the countless faces that flashed past her horizontal form, Etta thought at first she was mistaken, thought in her delirious state that he was some mirage. But it was him – and the stretcher was carrying her away.
She groped for the nearest arm, tugged and tried to gain their attention, and when they would not heed she attempted to raise herself precariously, jabbing and pointing frantically so that the stretcher was in danger of being tipped up, until those who transported her guessed that she wanted them to stop. Still gesturing, she directed her hand in his direction, whence they called to the one in civilian clothes who turned at their summons and was now frowning at their patient.
‘Monsieur, do you know this lady?’ one of them asked the portly gentleman with the greying beard.
And, still frowning, Pybus Ibbetson strolled up to her stretcher, looked down at his daughter and said without emotion, ‘Yes, I know her.’
Their eyes locked. In the intensity of his gaze she read the thought that was going through his brain: why wasn’t it you who died, and not my son?
‘The lady cannot speak, monsieur,’ said one of the nuns, and quickly explained what had happened and where they were taking her. ‘Do you wish to accompany her?’
Totally at his mercy, for he might be the only one who could find out what was happening to Marty, Etta’s dark eyes begged with all their might for him not to abandon her as he had done before.
After a tense moment, he said curtly that he would follow in his own transport.
It was not a large town but the slowness of the journey was agonising. Upon being put to bed in a celllike room at the convent, Etta’s first action was to indicate frantically that she needed a pencil and paper in order to communicate. However, this had already been thought of, and as her father was shown in they were handed to her. Immediately she scribbled the rumour of Marty’s arrest and asked if her father would find anything out for her.
‘Don’t you even want to know what I’m doing in Flanders?’ he demanded in a low, incredulous tone.
Trying to convey with tear-filled eyes that she already knew, she wrote one word: ‘John.’ Ibbetson tried to appear stalwart, though his own eyes gave him away and his voice, when he managed to respond, was hollow with grief. ‘I came to see the place where he died.’
There was a short silence whilst both composed themselves. Then Ibbetson changed the subject. ‘So what is this about that ne’er do well husband of yours? He’s been arrested, you say? I’m hardly surprised.’
Trying to contain her feeling of outrage at this slur, Etta scribbled anxiously: ‘Only rumour. Not heard from him in weeks. Can you find out? Please.’ And under this she pencilled Marty’s regimental number before presenting it for his gaze.
Ibbetson looked without compassion at her scrawlings, stared for so long and so detachedly that Etta feared he was going to refuse. She reached out to clasp his arm but he was not near enough, nor did he move any closer to oblige. But at least he said eventually, ‘I’ll see what I can do,’ before abruptly he left.
Unable to call out and ask when he would be back, left to wait and to wonder in these austere surroundings, a frantic Etta could scarcely believe it when he returned that same afternoon with news of Marty’s whereabouts.
‘It’s not good,’ he told her unblinkingly. ‘You were correct in being told that he has been arrested. In fact he’s already been tried and found guilty of desertion.’
Devastated, Etta seized her pad and scribbled: ‘Is he in prison?’
‘It’s worse than that,’ said her father. ‘He’s been sentenced to death.’
When the hysteria had died, when the silent scream no longer distorted her face, she had solicited the concerned nun at her bedside to go and search for her father and fetch him back, for she had omitted to ask where he was staying and feared he would be gone before she could enlist his help, which was now vital. But the sister had smiled benignly and said he was only waiting outside.
Why he was still there, Etta did not know, but she was grateful for the fact that he continued to visit her during the days it took for her to learn how to speak again, even though neither of them were to issue apology for past deeds, and interacted as strangers. In this time she was to discover that a man under sentence of execution was not immediately put to death but was entitled to have the proceedings reviewed at each higher level, and that pleas could be entered at any stage all the way up the chain of command, before the Commander in Chief gave final authorisation for the penalty to be carried out. She begged and pleaded with her father to help her save Marty, desperately wishing that she could shout her point of view instead of this pathetic, croaking whisper. ‘What can be done?’ he asked uninterestedly, having found out the details of the trial and relayed these to her. ‘The facts cannot be argued with, your husband deserted.’
‘No, I don’t believe it, there must be some compelling reason!’ Seated on a chair now, her tube removed but her wound still tender, Etta pressed her hand to her bandaged throat in order to hiss a painful defence, having to make up for the weakness of her vocal cords by injecting forcefulness with her eyes. ‘And even if he did, then should the rest of his family be punished for his misdeed? Please, please, can you not use your influence to save him?’
‘Had I the power of life and death would I not have used it to save my own son?’ he demanded gruffl
y. ‘He who died so valiantly defending his country and his comrades, whilst that…feckless oaf you married ran away?’
‘For the love of God!’ Her distorted voice beseeched him. ‘How can you remain so cold and unloving in the face of your child’s anguish?’
‘And where are your own children?’ he accused with a theatrical look around the bare white cell.
‘It’s only out of love for their father that I left them!’ hissed Etta. ‘And they’re not alone, they’re with affectionate grandparents.’ Then, still clutching her throat, her breast rising and falling with the effort, she frowned at him. ‘How did you know –’
‘That you have children? I made it a point to find out. Do you not think I know what goes on in my own house?’
From this she guessed, ‘So you are aware of our meetings with Mother? And of her assistance in my coming here? I’m surprised you allowed it.’
His aloof shrug indicated that this was of no account.
Her cavernous eyes observed him with disdain. ‘You never did set very much store by females, did you, Father? I doubt you’d still be here now if you hadn’t lost your son and heir and see that I’m the only one left.’
At last she had managed to provoke some sort of feeling from him. His eyes blazed at her. ‘Oh, how right I was about you! How bitter and spiteful you are.’
‘Spiteful?’ Her throat chafed as she hissed back at him, ‘No, I speak only the truth! You’re the one displaying the ultimate spite – refusing to save my husband from death! Because now you’ve got what you always wanted!’
He poured scorn on this. ‘You imagine I’ve made it my life’s ambition to wreak vengeance? I gave him not a second’s thought since that day, nor you neither.’
‘Then if it no longer matters to you one way or another, I beg you to err on the side of compassion! You know so many powerful men. You might not care for me, but do it for Celia and Edward and Alexandra and William.’ Naming them deliberately, she fixed her dark eyes to his, trying to solicit mercy. ‘You knew about Mother meeting her grandchildren, yet you never saw fit to make yourself known to them. Perhaps you will now that they’re the only ones you’ll ever have, much as you’d prefer them to be those of your beloved son.’
He was so furious she thought he was going to hit her, but she did not care – cared only that she might goad him into helping Marty.
‘Why are you so hurtful to them? To little children, your flesh and blood.’ Her fingers were aching from the act of clutching her throat in order to provide a voice, but her heart suffered more. She shook her head to convey utter disbelief. ‘Why must you allow their father to be killed?’
‘Because I have no say!’ came his virulent response. ‘Because he’s useless to them, useless as a man. My greatest service to them is to restore their rightful heritage.’
Etta’s expression changed. She formed a bitter laugh with her eyes. ‘Oh, how stupid, I see it all now! It isn’t me who’ll take John’s place as your heir, but my son.’
‘You could never take his place.’ He beheld her as if she were raving. ‘And neither could your brats…but they must suffice and I shall not let them down.’
She was expert at concealing her hurt, demanding in a tone as cold as her father’s, ‘Aren’t you forgetting something? My children’s name is not Ibbetson but Lanegan.’
‘And imagine the shame they’ll suffer to learn that the name which they hold has become synonymous with cowardice! Never could there be a greater burden.’ He almost shuddered with disgust. ‘Yet it does not have to be so. I can have them become Ibbetsons in the stroke of a pen.’
Etta could hardly believe he had reached such callous depths. ‘And what of their mother? Shall she revert to being called Miss Ibbetson too? Be spurned for having borne illegitimate children, for that’s what you conspire to make them by robbing them of their father’s name.’
‘I want you to come home too.’ Despite the hint of pardon in his eyes, it was a command.
‘And if I demur shall I be whipped into submission?’ Her own much darker eyes seethed with loathing for him. ‘You cannot treat me in such a manner any more, Father. Women have attained certain rights.’
‘Then you will not need my help,’ said Ibbetson bluntly, and without further ado, he left for good.
In the old days she would have screamed and wept and stamped her foot in order for him to take notice, but now, even if she could have managed it, there was no time for childish histrionics. In the deathly silence that followed his exit, knowing from reality that he would not repent, and that Marty could have only a few weeks or even days left, she was faced with the stark truth that she was alone in her fight to save him. And thus, even though she felt like sobbing, Etta reserved her emotional outpouring for a greater purpose. Instead she quickly sought practical assistance from the nuns, asked for pen and ink and stationery, the only weapons at her disposal. And thereto, she used the information her father had provided, wrote to Marty’s battalion commander, pleaded for her husband’s life, told of the four children who waited at home, of his parents who would die of shame if this sentence were carried out, of his greatuncle who had given his best years to the British Army, begged for a reprieve so that her husband might redeem himself. She used every grovelling tactic at her disposal, even resorted to falsehood and said that she herself was helping the war effort through her work with Lady Fenton, the scratching of pen on paper the only sound in this quiet place, finally coming to a halt with the request for him to forward this emotive plea to the Commander in Chief.
Satisfied to have done her best, she took up a fresh piece of paper, dipped her pen in the inkwell and wrote to her beloved husband, telling him to have strength for she was here, would not let him down, would fight to her last breath…
After this there remained only enough energy to scratch out a few words to her mother, to inform her what had occurred, and to tell her that Etta would never forgive her father for this ultimate cruelty.
Then, after making sure all three envelopes were immediately delivered, emotionally drained, she sat back to prepare herself for the worst, staring at the crucifix on an otherwise bare wall. And only then, in that quiet contemplation, did she perhaps begin to understand the true extent of her love for Marty: that she could never be whole without him; that his death was her death.
Sometimes, as a child, after he had come to understand by means of his grandmother’s demise that he himself was mortal, Marty had wondered what it would be like to die. He had envisaged himself going under a train, or in a blazing house, or tumbling off a cliff, or cascading down a waterfall to rocks below. In his boyhood fantasies he had even imagined what it would be like to be shot – had imagined it so much more clearly during his twelve months at war – but not once had it occurred to him that he would know the exact date and time of his expiry. Oh, he had not officially been appraised of this yet nor even of the verdict of his court martial, but he might as well have been, for, if acquitted, he would have been released there and then; hence without a word being uttered he knew himself to be damned, that he was most probably to be executed by his own compatriots for a crime he had not committed. This latter aspect was the worst thing of all – except, of course, death itself – the injustice of it, the way no one would listen, the way it had all been decided in twenty minutes, the way his emotively written defence, which had taken him ages to compose, had been ignored, the way all his brave deeds of the past year had been disregarded, the way he was referred to as the prisoner, sneered upon by his captors, reviled. When all he had done was snatch a few illicit hours’ sleep. Faced with eternal rest, to sleep was the hardest thing of all now, would have been impossible had he not been detailed for hard physical labour. Never sloth, he embraced wholeheartedly every exertion now, desperate for any chance to be outside, under sun or rain, would have braved snow and ice if it meant escape from these dreaded four walls that so concentrated the mind. Thus confined again following another day of transient liberty, his
energy might be spent but his senses were in no way dulled. With light beginning to fade, every sound became heightened. He flinched at every clink of key or exclamation, both feared and valued each approaching footstep, wondering, was it someone come to kill him or to save him.
But who would be his saviour? His friends’ attempts had been cackhanded. When he had failed to respond to his name at roll they had apparently told the officer that on the route march ‘someone’ had seen Lanegan gashed by shrapnel and that he had taken himself off to hospital, all in the hope that this would lend their pal time to catch up. Exposed as liars by the investigation, they too had been punished – Marty had felt guilty about that, learning of it from a sympathiser’s whispered divulgence through the bars – though their punishment was not half so severe as his. Despite all the trouble he had caused his battalion commander, the major had spoken up for him at the court martial, given evidence of Lanegan’s previous good character, recognised that he had still been in possession of his rifle when arrested, added that he did not feel this man should be made an example of simply to act as a deterrent to others, and had recommended mercy. But his adjudicators had preferred to unearth the disciplinary notes in Marty’s conduct sheet; the ones that told of the seven days’ imprisonment for his misdemeanour long before the war. They had pointed out that when found he had been many miles from where he should have been, which quite clearly indicated his intention to desert the battlefront. If the major could not save him, who would?
Through the bars in an outer wall of the civic centre his bleak eyes gazed through the dying light upon the market square of this small hop town, now a bustling garrison, and he gave thanks that his cell did not overlook the inner courtyard where the killingpost stood. But for all he tried to put this from his mind, it remained crammed with such thoughts. He thought of the poor sod whose execution he had bungled. He thought of his children, and, overcome by deep sadness, wept.
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